- Design the next stage of your career
- Expand your network
- Challenge your own thinking
- Help expand and stay focused on your vision
- Accelerate your learning and growth
We utilize a four-stage, ongoing process. Success is a journey, not a single destination.
Increase your self-awareness: Hands-down, self-awareness is the toughest challenge most of us will ever face. In Tasha Eurich’s excellent article in the Harvard Business Review— What Self-Awareness Really Is (and How to Cultivate It)
—she writes, “We’ve found that even though most people believe they are self-aware, self-awareness is a truly rare quality: We estimate that only 10%–15% of the people we studied actually fit the criteria.”
So, job number one is to cultivate and maintain true self-awareness. This means not only understanding how you perceive yourself, but also how others perceive you: your strengths, weaknesses, skills, habits, and core values.
Spot market trends and career opportunities: Your career is a jungle gym, not a ladder; few people go straight up the ladder. Instead, they take a twisting, turning path with more than a few unexpected developments towards leading a life of purpose and achievement. This sort of path requires the ability to spot trends at an early stage, and to take actions that best position you for not only your next move but also the one after that.
Working together, we will continually scan the landscape for both opportunities and threats.
Elevate your network: Who are your advisors, sponsors, and mentors? Do you understand the differences between these three essential roles? Are yours ideally suited to match your career aspirations?
It’s most likely time to elevate the core people around you, and also re-examine your relationships with them. For example, it’s wise to do an audit of sorts that reveals whether you are giving your advisors, sponsors, and mentors what they need from your relationship.
Be more quotable and engaging: Have you mastered both social validation as well as social media? Do you know how to serve others— broadening and deepening your network while also advancing your own goals? Far too many highly capable professionals essentially keep themselves a secret, and thus never capture the opportunities they were born to tackle.
It’s no longer enough to simply put your head down and do your job; in today’s world, you must be able to communicate effectively with the weak connections that are ultimately your bridge to a more gratifying and impactful future.
THIS CYCLE IS AN ONGOING PROCESS. You’ll make progress in just a few months, but your continued success will be dependent on your ability to keep cycling through these four essential stages.
If you are a curious, lifelong learner, and are passionate about advancing from Now 2 Next, let’s talk.
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